Page 5 of The Whisper Place
I’d gotten turned around trying to leave town, though, and ended up in downtown instead of back on the highway. At 7:00 a.m. on a Sunday, the high-rises and commercial buildings and parking garages looked empty and inviting. And I realized, with a slow, unfurling wonder filling my chest, that I didn’t have anywhere to be, no schedule to keep, no one tracking my time or decisions. I was free to do anything I wanted. I could say no for any reason or none at all. Every choice was mine and mine alone. I didn’t know how long the freedom would last but for this one morning, in a town where no one knew me, it didn’t matter. I was unbound.
I parked on a side street and wandered through downtown, passing joggers in sweats and homeless people tucked into corners and sleeping on benches. I followed a squirrel through a cobblestone street, past a playground, and out to the sidewalk where the mouthwatering scent of cinnamon stopped me mid-stride.
Pastries & Dreams. I shouldn’t, but before my head could catch up and put a stop to the impulse, I’d already opened the creaky wooden door and stepped into an enclosed porch-turned-dining area. Small bistro tables lined both sides of the room, and two students hunched over steaming cups at the far end of the space.
I moved into the next room lined with bakery cases and a coffee station. No one was behind the counter, but the sound of clattering dishes came from deeper within the house. “Total Eclipse of the Heart” belted on a speaker overhead and a silent TV in the corner played the Colin Firth version ofPride and Prejudice, the one Mom and I used to watch while comparing each scene to the book. Mr.Darcy rode a horse across the screen, looking constipated and full of himself, but still pretty hot. I leaned into the nearest bakerycase, instantly torn between a maple pecan scone and a giant slice of coffee cake with cinnamon oat crumble piled on top. My stomach growled.
“There are no bad choices.”
The voice shot my spine straight and I turned, feeling like I’d been caught doing something wrong. The woman behind the counter wiped down a serving tray and put it away. “I mean in that case there’s no bad choices. Outside of it?” She shrugged and winked. “An infinite number.”
I swallowed. “Maybe I should just crawl inside and live there.”
“I’ve tried. The headroom is shit. What can I get you?”
The pastry labels didn’t have prices on them. Five dollars. I could spend five dollars here, but I wanted coffee, too. “I’m not sure.”
“Take your time.”
Pulling on gloves, she moved to a sheet of freshly baked cookies and started stacking them in another case. Her bright pink hair swooped over one shoulder in a long, thick braid, with a black silk rose clipped behind her ear. A flour-covered apron was tied over a charcoal wide-necked T-shirt. She wore a silver hoop in one nostril and the kind of winged eyeliner that always smudged and made me look like a natural disaster victim. On her it was impeccable.
A timer went off in the back and she disappeared for a second, giving me time to find the menu board and add up the cost of a small drip and a scone. $6.50 plus tax. The coffee cake was more. I bit my lip and watched Colin Firth ask Jennifer Ehle to dance and murmured the words along to the silent TV as she turned him down cold. “Mr. Darcy is all politeness.”
“The best Elizabeth Bennet of all time. I will take no questions on the matter.”
“Agreed.” I swiveled back to the counter. The baker was setting a tray of muffins topped with chopped walnuts down to cool. “But Matthew Macfadyen is the best Darcy.”
“Fuck right out of my store.”
I didn’t know what surprised me more, that she would throw customers out over fictional men or that she owned this place. She didn’t look much older than me.
“He has anxiety. It explains why—”
“It explains why he’s not proud, which invalidates the entire premise. You can climb into the case now. You clearly need to make better choices.”
Normally I shrank from confrontation, trying to smooth the edges of whatever conflict rose up around me, apologizing, deflecting, agreeing with anything to get out of the situation as soon as possible. But something about this baker, about this place, felt different. Maybe it was the cinnamon, the memories of Sunday mornings baking in the kitchen with Mom while her favorite movies played in the background, her determination to introduce me to Meg Ryan, Julia Roberts, and Audrey Hepburn. Maybe it was the baker’s energy, the flour-dusted warmth radiating off her even as she pointed at the bakery case and ordered me to climb inside.
I stepped up to the counter and pulled out my wallet. “You can be proud and anxious at the same time. I’ll take a maple scone and a small dark roast.”
An hour later, the scone was a core memory and a mess of crumbs on the table. I was on my last sip of coffee, long cold but still biting and delicious. Sunday-morning traffic had picked up considerably. I watched the chaotic influx of university students and hotel guestsfrom across the street, some of them taking orders to go, but most crowding into the tiny porch dining room and snatching up a table as soon as it was available. A couple holding to-go cups and a newspaper pretended not to stare at my empty plate as they loitered by the entrance. I sipped the last dregs from the empty mug, cradling it in my hands, and watched the kitchen until they gave up and left.
I should’ve let them have my table, but the view was fascinating. I didn’t have a phone to scroll or a book to read or a class to study for, and without anything distracting me, I’d spent the entire hour immersed in the bakery and the woman behind the counter.
She didn’t have any help, which she mentioned to a few customers who commented on the wait time for their breakfast sandwiches. “My morning person had a medical issue, so it’s all me until I can hire someone new. You looking for a job?”
Her smile was quick and sharp and her tone shut down any further bitching before it started.
It was amazing, actually, how well she handled everything on her own, pivoting from the coffee station to the bakery cases to the kitchen with two or three items in her hands at all times, constantly moving and bending and reaching like some complicated dance in time with the opening and closing of the front door.
A group of eight students came in, girls in black and gold sweats with bleary faces, all talking over each other and crowding up to the counter. I couldn’t pretend to drink my empty coffee anymore. Reluctantly I got up and skirted the group as I looked for the tub to leave my dirty dishes.
I didn’t know where to go after this. I had to find my car, get back on the freeway, and pick a direction. It made sense to keep going west. Mentally, I traced a route on the map, saw mountains risingup to greet me on the horizon, and beyond them, an ocean. Would I stay there? How far did I need to go before it was safe to stop driving?
I almost missed the dish tub because it was completely buried under dirty dishes. There was no room in the tub or the cramped counter space around it to fit anything without playing a dangerous game of Tetris. I glanced at the woman behind the counter, who was still smiling and answering questions but clearly outnumbered by the swarm of students texting, taking pictures of the bakery cases, and debating cold press vs. drip.
“Just leave it anywhere,” the woman called to me, but the group of girls blocked her view of the tub. She couldn’t see how full it was.
An industrial-size sink was barely visible through a doorway to the kitchen. Before I realized what I was doing, I’d moved around the counter and brought my dishes into the kitchen. The sink was already half-full of pans, but there was room for my small plate and mug.
